2024-07-16 13:37:10
Officials who constantly monitor the digital space recorded a greater activation of messages before the Pride march. Issues related to the War in Ukraine and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict remain sensitive topics.
Hate speech is defined in Article 170 of the Criminal Code: it is incitement against any nation, race, ethnic, religious or other group of people. Commonly identified as public mockery, humiliation, promotion of discrimination or incitement of hatred against persons of a certain group based on age, gender, sexual orientation, disability, religion, etc.
Violations of the use of prohibited symbols are defined in Article 524 of the Code of Administrative Offenses. This is the distribution and display of symbols of Nazi, communist, totalitarian regimes. According to a representative of the Virtual Patrol, the use of communist symbols (hammer and sickle) or St. George’s stripes is most often observed.
Reports have increased ahead of the Pride march
The virtual patrol both proactively constantly monitors various channels and receives reports from people who have noticed possible violations.
“We have been monitoring the digital space for three years. We constantly check certain Facebook groups, news portal accounts or sources of reports noticed by citizens. We notice the activation of potential violations before various events that are considered sensitive in society. As one of the latest examples, we can mention the Pride march that took place in early June. Then, a week before the event, we noticed incitement of hatred in the comments following news portal reports – it was encouraged to fight back, to use physical violence due to sexual orientation”, says Tomas Špigelskis, chief investigator of the Prevention Division of the Activity Coordination and Control Board of the Public Order Bureau of the Police Department.
According to the official, hate speech from both sides of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is sometimes seen online. T. Špigelski points out that after the start of the war in Ukraine, there are hate speeches directed against people of Russian and Ukrainian nationality.
Prohibited characters
The police officer notes that the motive for using prohibited symbols remains nostalgia for the Soviet era or expressing support for Russia. This is communist symbolism – hammer and sickle or Georgian stripes.
“Even redistributing a prohibited symbol made public by another person on a personal Facebook account can also be considered a violation,” observes T. Špigelskis.
Officers monitoring the digital space find most of the information, evaluate it and then pass it on to colleagues to make it as easy as possible to investigate a potential breach.
Residents, seeing violations in the electronic space, can report it via private message on social media. on the page created on Facebook: www.facebook.com/policijosvirtualuspatrulis.
It became active after the proposal to abandon the Russian language in schools
Monitoring of potential cyber threats on the dark web, in various social networks. the team of the Vilnius municipality also performs preventative measures in Telegram groups.
“Usually, we notice the activation of hostile groups after various political statements or decisions related to Russia or China. For example, after the news about the proposal to abandon the teaching of the Russian language in schools or after the news reported in the media about the cooperation between Lithuania and Taiwan”, says Jonas Pidkovas, head of the Innovation Technologies Group of the Vilnius City Municipality Administration.
According to the expert, teams gather in the forums and plans are made to harm certain institutions in the digital space – to “hack” pages or systems. “Then we observe the situation more closely, what is planned to be attacked, whether it is the network of schools or the municipality’s basement, and we react accordingly,” says J. Pidkovas.
Shares signs of potential cyber threats
Cyber security professionals note that both the use of hate speech and the use of prohibited symbols can be added to the list of cyber security threats.
According to Viliaus Benetis, director of the cyber security company NRD Cyber Security, the source of cyber security threats are always people. “Some do it for personal incentives and for more adrenaline, others for financial gain, and others for the strategic interests of countries. It is likely that a considerable part of disinformation, hateful speech or symbols is spread at the behest of a specific country – for example, Russia or Belarus – when carrying out information attacks on social networks”, observes the cyber security expert.
The company’s experts also conduct cyber threat intelligence. Analysts working in Lithuania continuously conduct cyber threat intelligence. Dark Internet forums, Telegram groups are infiltrated, information is monitored in discussion and announcement forums publicly available on the Internet, soc. on the X network.
Currently, the company is implementing the SOCshare project together with the Vilnius municipality, which allows collecting and sharing signs of cyber attacks and hacks, as well as recognizing and reacting to potential threat indicators.
2024-07-16 13:37:10